


Caged Beast

by cyanideinsomnia



Category: The Arcana (Visual Novel)
Genre: (mercedes voice) dad you seem kinda stressed do you want some weed, Angst, Angst and Feels, Feral Behavior, Gen, Ghost Goat Lucio (The Arcana), Introspection, Isolation, Mentioned Apprentice (The Arcana), Mind Games, Narcissism, Rated T for Trashmouth, Self-Destruction, Self-Harm, Self-Hatred, Unreliable Narrator, going slightly mad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-04
Updated: 2020-01-04
Packaged: 2021-02-27 09:15:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,513
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22114717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cyanideinsomnia/pseuds/cyanideinsomnia
Summary: For three long years, Lucio wandered the Between, trapped in his wing like an animal in a cage. For three long years, he was alone.
Comments: 11
Kudos: 63





	Caged Beast

**Author's Note:**

> in this one the apprentice didn't get the paid scene in the prologue where you can meet him, although i don't remember if you actually go upstairs if you don't

In the beginning, he thought he could fight his way out of it. 

After all, brute force had gotten him out of plenty of situations where he was trapped, when words failed and beating a hasty retreat was not an option. But that had been against people and wild beasts, not a whole damn dimensional space. 

Less than a dimensional space - the space between dimensions. An empty gap in the middle.

How do you brute force _nothing_?

Lucio learned early on that no amount of gnashing of uncomfortably sharp teeth and animal claws would open up the gray haze covering his wing. It didn’t stop him from rattling against the bars of his cage, slamming his new, grotesque body into the walls as though it might break through, angered and relieved that he could hardly feel the impact.

He’d torn apart his own rooms more than once, given the strength he was denied before. Whatever came under his claws, he threw it against the walls, at the floor, a whirlwind of ash and aggravation. The only thing he couldn’t touch was the Painting on the back wall, standing proud despite being gray, the face blurred but beautiful as ever. He didn’t want to know what would happen if he found himself turning on that.

It used to be a lot of work just to hold something, feeling so distant from it, but by sheer force of blind, primal rage - red, raw, animal rage - he’d learned how to push back against the physical world.

He knew if he didn’t hold onto that anger, he’d be forced to _think._

***

In the beginning, he thought it would wear off on its own, a temporary parlor trick.

Maybe it would take a few days. Maybe a few months. Maybe even an entire year, as terrible as that seemed. He could survive one year - he would be handsome and corporeal again just in time for the Masquerade, and he could party like nothing had ever happened.

A year came and went. The Masquerade never came - with the Count dead and the Countess comatose, he liked to think the city spent that first year in mourning - and he continued to roam these halls with hooves and horns.

The hooves were the hardest part. He spent several of those early days on his haunches in his bed, afraid to put weight on the spindly appendages for fear of breaking them and leaving himself lame for however long this was going to last. He already missed his golden arm, forgetting about the nub in its place until he tried to use it to steady himself on the wall, ignobly smacking into it on top of staggering about like a newborn colt on these stupid legs. 

He’d grown used to approaching things left hand first, because it would be hard to doublecross a man with metal claws in your wrist. The right hand wasn’t an imbecile, it was still dominant in other ways - he just found himself automatically lurching left, nub swiping miles away from what he meant to grab.

Small blessings that no one had seemed to notice.

***

In the beginning, he thought he had the run of the entire Palace like this, gray and empty but at least he could come and go as he pleased. 

These hooves were probably better meant for the grass of the Gardens rather than the tile of the halls, and though he could hardly feel the warmth of sunlight against his fur, he could at least appreciate the open air. The balcony could only provide so much, a peek of life outside his cage.

He remembered making his way towards the gate hidden in the wall at the edge of his domain, hoping that maybe it would fix this, and if not, he would at least be outside. He remembered the odd lurch in his chest as he reached it, a sharp tug against his heart like someone had leashed it and he’d found the end of that leash. He remembered stretching his neck in vain to reach the gate with his snout, if nothing else, mere inches away before the pain pulled him back.

It was worse when he tried to leave the wing altogether. The claws in his chest bodily pulled him back, hooves scraping against the tile as he tried to dig them in, helpless to stop it. He had been trying to go to Nadia, to check on her. Maybe it was for the best, so she wouldn’t have to see him like this if she was awake. 

He wondered if he would still be like this whenever it was she woke up. If she woke up.

***

In the beginning, he assumed no one came because they thought he was dead, and the devastating loss would be too fresh to bear seeing the state of his rooms.

Well, it wasn’t no one. No one he _wanted_ to see. He made the mistake of coming out of hiding when the Courtiers - not all of them, not the one he liked in any case - came to his door, let them know he was here in hopes they could help him escape this. They had hardly been of any help before, but he was desperate and alone. 

Instead they took one look at his hopeful animal eyes and disgusting furry body and berated him for decisions he hardly remembered making. 

He already _knew_ it was his fault. He’d done this. He didn’t want to be reminded of it, least of all when he’d been on the verge of asking for help, the words dying in his throat as he let his form slip into the shadows where it belonged, making no move to come back out when their voices called for him, questioning at first and then demanding. If this was the only company he was allowed, then he was better off alone.

That night he discovered this body was still capable of producing tears, a shimmering silver mess that sank into his fur like blood.

He didn’t want to be alone. 

He couldn’t bear it when he was dying, when his doctor and his wife and his magician slipped further away from him, cutting off all contact that wasn’t strictly scientific, not even _pretending_ to mask their hatred of him anymore. He couldn’t bear it now, when he had no choice but to wait for the hint of someone, anyone, to decide it was worth visiting these rooms. Even as a curiosity, or a memorial. He couldn’t stand the silence.

… silence wasn’t the right word for it, either. 

In the absence of human activity, he had begun to hear something more ominous in the dark. Unlike the Courtiers, waiting for it to go away only strengthened it, whispers and snarls and hisses against his ears and the edges of his consciousness, his mind blocking out the words in an attempt to protect himself from whatever the hell the darkness wanted him for. 

He knew if he let himself listen, even for a moment, it would easily take him. Day by day, he began to wonder if that was such a bad thing. He could already feel his mind slipping.

Sometimes one of those voices sounded like his own.

***

Without the yearly constant of the Masquerade, time stretched and ran together and bled into itself, incomprehensible inside his cage. 

It could still be that first night after he lost his body, it could be centuries later - he had no way of knowing, hardly able to tell the seasons apart anymore when he glanced out from the balcony. It was all gray. Cold and gray and _nothing_ , just like him. 

His consciousness had begun to run together as well, mind stretched thin like taffy between the edges of his wing, wearing down and wearing down and wearing down until his nerves were stripped bare and painful. The silence was a cacophony, his own hooves too loud in his ears, scrape scrape _clink_ skritch against the marble floor. He wanted to tear them off his legs. 

The desire to tear apart this body was surfacing more often, lately. Claws and teeth in his fur, ripping out silver tufts, trying to get down to the skin and the blood and the bone, where maybe his human body was waiting to be let free, trapped inside this disgusting husk. Time didn’t pass, but the fur and skin _always_ grew back, no matter how deep the wounds were, how much dark oily blood and shimmering silver tears spread across the hallways. The pain never lasted long enough to be real.

When his dogs came, he had to fight down the instinct to tear into them as well, to have meat under his teeth that wasn’t his. The monster inside him was stopped by the scent of chamomile and jasmine on their fur, their dull eyes and slow gaits, tails sluggishly whumping against the floor as they sat down in front of him nearly out of reach.

They were drugging his dogs. Making them calmer and easier to keep out of the way in his absence. 

Their coats were still immaculate, indicating they weren’t completely neglected, and they could have very well put them down instead of keeping them - but it was clear no one actually _wanted_ to keep them. 

Just like no one wanted him. 

He curled around them the best he could, whispering desperate praises to them, such good dogs, Daddy missed you, sinking his claws into their fur to pet and stroke them and shaking as the urge to tear himself apart rose again, the faint wet warmth of dog tongues against his snout the only thing keeping him grounded.

The next time they came up, it was only Mercedes, and she had a small cloth in her mouth that smelled of chamomile. She left it at his door and trotted back downstairs while he came out to investigate.

Onyx claws nudged the cloth the rest of the way open, revealing small baked treats, dog sized. Claws of hunger he’d been forcibly ignoring twisted painfully in his gut, driving him to snap at his gift with his teeth long before considering picking them up to eat them like a civilized creature, whining softly as his jaws instead closed on nothing, scraping uselessly through cloth, floor and treat like they didn’t exist.

This really _was_ hell, if he couldn’t even eat a fucking dog treat.

He wasn’t sure if it would be worse or better if he _had_ succeeded, the great Count Lucio on his knees on the floor desperately licking up the crumbs of a drugged up dog cookie like an animal himself, nevermind that he currently looked the part.

The hunger never left. 

***

The whispers in the dark melded with the whispers of the servants in the Gardens, drifting up to him from the balcony. He knew it wasn’t the darkness telling him Nadia was awake, that she had an important announcement to make.

A jolt of hope sprung painfully in his heart, scrambling from his ash-strewn bed and diving out of the bedroom on all threes, loping towards the edge of his domain. He likely would have slipped and fallen down the stairs if it wasn’t for the supernatural chains that forcibly tugged him back, and yet for a moment he hardly cared about that, straining his neck and his ears for the sights and sounds of his wife.

Maybe she would come up here and see what had happened to him. Maybe she would help him fix this. He could trust her. Far more than the Courtiers, in any case.

Waiting was agonizing, like hot coals buried in his hooves, driving deeper with each passing second, making it hard to stand still. He wanted nothing more than to go down there and greet her himself, no matter what he looked like. He would worry about what she thought later. He had to see her now.

At the barest whiff of jasmine that may have been in his addled mind, he immediately lunged forward to dive down the steps, straining directly into whatever force that kept him trapped, a yowl of agony and frustration escaping his throat before he could stop it as it felt like his skin was being peeled back from his body from the snout outwards, black and red instead of gray, searing claws hooked into his flesh and heart violently pulling him back once more. 

For a moment he was being torn in half, one going forth, the other back, before he stumbled back to the floor at the top of the steps, intact and shaking. It hurt so much. 

She wasn’t coming. He was suddenly very sure of it. 

He limped back to the safety of his rooms to continue waiting regardless.

***

On his way to the balcony he felt the brush of another presence - energy that was frightening and yet familiar, magic that was old and yet new. He could hear the click of manicured claws on the stone steps, followed by human footsteps, an unfamiliar voice crying out for the dogs to stop.

A visitor…? 

He turned in time to see his dogs pulling a young magician up the steps, urging them into his domain before simply leaving them there like an offering. 

They certainly didn’t _look_ like the source of the energy, but yet they were, drifting through the hall from them like sickening waves, cold dread prickling his hackles up. The most important part here, though, was that they were _a real human being in his domain_ , the first in what felt like eternity. 

(And a pretty cute one, too, by the looks of it.)

Still burned from his earlier attempt to go down the steps, he was hesitant to go to them, instead hanging back at the edge of the hallway, an awkward paralysis settling into his limbs. He realized at that moment that he’d forgotten what it was like to interact with a human, and barely remembered _being_ human. All he knew was that he was once beautiful.

He shifted his weight to move towards the other end of the hall, and froze as the young magician’s head whipped directly towards him, their eyes meeting his glowing red ones.

They could see him. They knew he was here. They--

… were running down the steps, away from him. Didn’t even stop to look back.

He was alone again, abandoned by a complete stranger just like he’d been abandoned by everyone else. 

Something inside him twisted, broken laughter in a broken voice he couldn’t recognize pouring out of him and echoing through the halls, laughing at some cosmic joke he could hardly comprehend. Maybe he was the cosmic joke. 

The next flash of human skin was greeted with the usual rattling chains and angered howls, the monster inside him baying for their blood. He was tired of waiting.

***

The Masquerade was coming back, said the grapevine. Nadia was hosting the Masquerade again this year. Isn’t that exciting? 

We don’t need the Count to have fun, said the shadows. The Masquerade will be so much better without him there to spoil it.

His nerves had been worn further down to feral nubs, bright and red and brittle. He prowled his halls in a heightened state, frustrated and hungry and frustrated because he was hungry, shreds of Masquerades before circling his broken mind like streamers in the dark, taunting him with sights and sounds and smells. He knew there would be more, so much more, he wouldn’t be able to stand it.

It belonged to him. It was his party. It was the one damn thing in this stupid city that he was gladly, solely responsible for, looked forward to, was loved for. So much more important than they knew. One bright beacon in the darkness of this hell, taken from him-- and for what? To prove she didn’t need him?

She’d already proven that, time and time again. Now she was just twisting the knife in his back.

Little pinpricks of agony pressed against his fur with every step, like leeches burrowing into his skull, his hackles raised and unable to lie flat. Eyes. Eyes on him. Eyes everywhere, surrounding him, watching him prowl and huff and snarl. He whirled and snapped at nothing, and the eyes didn’t move.

It took him too long to realize it was his own eyes crawling across his pelt like ants, from the numerous portraits lining the hall. A myriad of young, beautiful men staring down at him, judging his matted fur and the remains of his left arm, exposed and disgusting like it hadn’t been in years. 

He could hardly see them but he could feel them, and his lips raised, teeth bared, rounding on the nearest sneering, smiling portrait. 

“Don’t fucking look at me like that.” 

His younger, human self impudently stared back.

Without a second thought he lunged for the portrait, driving sharp teeth directly into those staring, beautiful eyes, tearing apart that beautiful face with a swift snap of his jaws. If _he_ couldn’t have that face, who gave these inanimate objects the right to have it?

Once he started he couldn’t stop, wouldn’t stop until his fur no longer crawled under their scrutinizing gazes, until every last picture of himself had been rendered as blind as their living counterpart felt in that moment, vision blotted out in red like blood, like they were bleeding under the onslaught. He could almost taste it, his blood - a trail of oily black dribbling down to the floor indicated he’d bitten himself in his frenzy.

Another burst of broken laughter, laughing into the holes in the nearest ruined painting. 

Of _course_ he’d bitten himself. That was the _point_.

***

He stood before the tall painting on the back wall, numbly gazing at it with something like wonder and resentment.

A reminder of what he couldn’t have, proudly standing there. Untouched, beautiful. His constant companion in his darkest hours, its presence tinged with jagged red edges of desperation. It stood watch as the Plague had slowly consumed him, when he’d burned alive, when he awoke with hooves and horns, when he cried like a frightened child in the dark.

It knew too much. It saw too much. It hurt too much.

His pulse pounded in his keen ears like heavy war drums, calling his broken mind into battle, compelling him to step towards the portrait, animal jaws already parted for the killing blow. He rested his hand against the frame, still so gentle, slowly craning his neck towards his own face, breath too hot and quick against the canvas.

This close, he could see more detail in that beautiful face, seeing only gray but knowing there was gold and silver, riches unobtainable to him right now. His heart swelled painfully in his chest, aching like a lover scorned, fingertips rising from the frame with the intent to caress, flinching back moments before they made contact.

What the hell was he doing?

His jaws snapped shut around air rather than canvas, inches away from his face. He gently leaned his forehead against the one in the painting, as though it could feel him, dragging a shuddering sigh through tightly clenched fangs, clenched hard enough to ache to prevent himself from lunging anyway. 

The impulse to destroy was still burning in his skull, maddening and red. If he let his control slip, he realized, he would not only be destroying a favored companion, but the last vestige of his human face. There were no more after this. He had taken away all the others. 

This was all that was left of him as he was.

His ears pinned back, body trembling with the effort of holding himself back and coming sobs, knowing he should pull his head away before the tears came in case they would ruin it as well but unable to let go, as though it would change him back through prolonged contact, or he could step inside the painting and let this beautiful creature take his place outside.

_I can help you._

Words slid into his fraying consciousness like oily vipers, honeyed tones and sweet promises brushing against his racing mind. He could understand the whispers in the dark, now, too focused on the painting to block them out. 

The most compelling voice was the one that sounded like his own, but so much deeper and colder. He briefly wondered if the painting was speaking to him.

_We have unfinished business, you and I. I can set you free, if you do what you’re told._

“Please..” He gasped, the last fragments of his will crumbling against the canvas. “Let me out, please, I.. I can’t.. I’ll do anything…” 

A sharp bolt of agony twisted through his chest as though he was at the edge of his domain again, dropping him to his hand and knees on the floor in front of the painting with a pained whimper. The chain twisted around his heart had changed hands.

_I know you will._

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know if I went deep enough, I may edit this later


End file.
